Reward programs have gained popularity as marketing tools for incentivizing individuals to perform transactions using accounts. In a conventional reward program, a reward account of the individual is linked to a financial account to allow the individual to receive a type of benefit in exchange for using the financial account in performing transactions. The benefit may be of a variety of types including the accumulation of reward units, such as reward points or miles. The reward units may be redeemed for goods and services, such as airline travel and consumer products offered by certain merchants and service providers.
Those rewards redeemed for travel related services are not insured. Therefore, if a consumer redeems a reward, such as reward units, for travel related services and the travel related services are cancelled, the reward is lost and the reward, or even a portion of the reward, is not reallocated to the consumer for later redemption for the same or different services (or goods). Furthermore, for those goods and services that have some type of insurance or warranty associated therewith, the insurance or warranty is paid for with cash or credit.
A need exists therefore for reward insurance that replenishes all or a portion of a reward used to purchase a good or service for a qualified reason. Moreover, there is a need for purchasing insurance, including warranties on goods, by redeeming a reward, such as reward units.